The Wickedest Lord Alive (8 page)

“Your father has lately been obliged to leave England,” said Xavier.

Her eyes were wide. “Did you have something to do with that?”

“I?” said Xavier, disconcerted at her insight. “Why should you think that?”

It had taken years to slowly dismantle Bute’s fortune piece by piece, but Xavier was nothing if not patient. Bankrupt, hounded by creditors, Bute had fled to the Continent. Xavier had done that to him in vengeance for Nerissa. And for this girl.

She shook her head, frowning into the distance. “I saw you that night, you know. With that whip wrapped around his throat.” She met his eyes briefly, then looked away. “A part of me was glad.”

So that was it. He’d feared his violence was the cause of her flight. Had she also seen his mother? Might she have recognized Nerissa with lash marks crossing her lower back like ghastly stay laces? Could that slip of a girl possibly have interpreted the scene correctly when even he had not?

“How did you keep apprised of my welfare?” she said. “Was it Lady Chard?”

“Mr. Allbright kept me informed.”

Her hand flew to her cheek. “Mr. Allbright! He knows?”

“He knows,” said Xavier.

“Oh.
Oh
.” She swayed and groped a little, as if for support, but there was nothing solid within her reach except him. He took her elbow to steady her and slipped her fan from her slackened grasp. He led her to sit on the bench.

Flipping his tails, Xavier sat beside her and waited.

She buried her face in her hands. “All this time…” Her voice was muffled, but he made out the words. “All this time I’ve felt so guilty and he … He knew.”

He waited, hoping she would not turn into one of those hysterical females he so deplored.

It was a lot to take in, of course. He couldn’t blame her for being upset. But he had to tell her these things. They’d make it easier for her to accept what now must be.

She didn’t weep, however. Her breath came in huge, shuddering gasps, which, affected him in some strange way he couldn’t quite define.

“Look at me,” he said, and knew a fleeting wish that his voice didn’t always sound so clipped and cold.

Slowly, she lowered her hands and raised her head.

In a low tone, he said, “I had hoped never to bother you again. But now I need your help, Alexandra.”

“Lizzie,” she corrected on a long exhale. “My name is Lizzie now. I won’t answer to anything else.”

“Lizzie, then.”

He turned her fan in his hands, frowning down at it. He opened it, then shut it again. For some reason, it was far more difficult to phrase his proposition than he’d expected.

He met her gaze. “Lizzie,” he said, “it is time for you to fulfill your duties as my wife.”

Chapter Six

Reeling from the marquis’s disclosures, Lizzie fought in vain for calm. All those times she’d lied to Mr. Allbright—flat-out
lied
to him—and he’d never shown by the flicker of an eyelash that he knew the truth. The vicar’s capacity for forgiveness humbled and shamed her.

Slowly, she came back to the present. With a jolt, she realized what Steyne actually wanted. Well, hadn’t she anticipated something of the sort?

“You need an heir,” she said dully.

“We are married, ma’am. I could attempt to beguile you with pretty words, but I don’t believe in prevarication.”

She gave a choked, mirthless laugh. She could not imagine him ever indulging in flattery.

“Just so,” he said, as if he read her thoughts. “You see, you are the only one who can give me a legitimate heir.”

“I’m not a simpleton, my lord,” she snapped. Of course she saw his point. It was abundantly clear. What she did not understand was why he’d abandoned her in the first place. Why he’d waited until now to pluck her from obscurity.

And Mr. Allbright had never given her the slightest hint.…

She thought of the vicar’s words to her tonight and touched the pearls at her throat.

She supposed she must be glad she hadn’t known Steyne was aware of her presence here. Rejected not merely once, but every day of the eight years since they married. He could have come for her at any time, yet he had not.

“I daresay this has all come as something of a surprise,” Steyne said.

A
surprise
? She almost laughed. “Indeed.”

“You will need time to collect yourself,” he said. “But allow me to tell you now that my decision won’t alter.”

Some of her spirit returned. “Regardless of my wishes? You do not even care that I am thoroughly opposed to … to…”

He watched her and let her flounder without mercy. Then he said with something of a purr, “I will teach you any number of terms for what we are going to do, dear Lizzie. And any number of ways to experience pleasure.”

In spite of her smarting pride, a dark thrill shot through her. The image of him moving over her in the candlelight made her throat tighten and her heart beat faster.

“You are shocking and … and vulgar. I won’t listen to you.”

She remembered the high, hot burst of ecstasy, the unwilling sense of closeness she’d felt in his arms. All that, despite their lack of empathy or acquaintance.

The words she’d overheard earlier that evening rang in her ears:
Love has nothing to do with it.

To surrender herself to his ministrations without the slightest hope or expectation of love—that would be torment, indeed. To take this man inside her, yet never come close to touching anything inside him.

To know that no matter how much she might long for true intimacy, such emotional connection was beyond him.

If she hadn’t experienced the depth of his remoteness for herself that night, she might well have been tempted by his looks, his rakish audacity, and his air of mystery. But the desolation she’d known when he’d left her with such brutal coldness was the greatest anguish she’d ever experienced.

It was as if she’d climbed aboard a life raft after years on a desert isle, and the raft had marooned her in some arctic wasteland. But she’d escaped her father’s house by her wits and determination, with no one to help her. She’d found a haven, safe and warm, in Little Thurston.

Now she said, “If I refuse?”

He could not, would not, force her to do this. She knew she’d have to obey him eventually, but she wasn’t going to make it easy for him. She wanted to punish him in some small measure for leaving her behind.

He did not answer at first. Then he said, “Do not defy me, Lizzie. You’ll discover I always get my way in the end.”

She persisted. “That night, you said we would not be obliged to see each other again.”

“
Now
she remembers,” he murmured with a sideways glance. His gaze lowered to her fan. “I repented of that statement almost immediately. I came back for you.”

She hadn’t known that. She’d seen the shocking tableau in her father’s bedchamber and fled.

With the small, insidious hope that her new husband had indeed made an end of her sadistic father. And the sure knowledge that she did not want to be there to find out.

He had violence in him, this nobleman, and a ruthless determination. He would not scruple to do what was necessary to take her. Even so, his gentleness with her that fateful night was something she also remembered. The fleeting moments of tenderness. The wild, throbbing pleasure he’d drawn from her body, even against her will.

The knowledge that he had returned to claim her on their wedding night gave his present demand a wholly different complexion. If he’d taken her away with him that night, she’d have given him sons gladly. Or at least, willingly.

Could he grow to love her? As their history stood, it seemed beyond the realm of possibility.

But children …
Children
. She’d never let herself even think of having babies to love.

He sighed. “Two sons. That’s all I ask.”

She choked.
“All?”

“If we are very lucky, it won’t take more than a few years of, ah, cohabitation.”

Oh, dear Lord. She hardly trusted her own voice. “And after that?” she managed.

He waved a hand. “Naturally, you may go your own way. You might please to remain at my country estate. You could even purchase a home of your own in Little Thurston if you wished. You and I would lead separate lives.”

She marveled at him. This sort of existence was utterly opposed to the interested involvement, the sense of community and happiness she’d found in Little Thurston.

The thought made her heart give a hard ache.

She rose. “My lord, I can only suggest that you are perhaps a little mad. None of these prospects entices me in the least.”

He stood also. “I am sorry to hear that. Most ladies would jump at the chance to be a marchioness.”

Perhaps most ladies would, but not Lizzie. She’d lived without love or kindness while surrounded by luxury. She did not value material wealth.

Suddenly, she knew she could never be happy with Steyne unless he loved her. Because she very much feared she was falling in love with him.

“Why didn’t you have me declared dead?” she said with suppressed violence. “Find a willing female to bear your children like a docile broodmare? I’m sure there must be any number of them lining up for the honor.”

He watched her for the longest time, until she wanted to scream at him to speak.

“Because I want you,” he said finally. “No one else will do.”

That stunning pronouncement made her flush with ire. “You mock me.”

“I assure you I do not.”

Unconvinced, she paced away from him, then turned. “Will you expose me? If you tell my neighbors I’m your wife, I’ll deny all memory of it.”

“I have no desire to be a nine days’ wonder in this village or anywhere else,” said Steyne. “Do you think I wish anyone to know I was forced to wed you? Not to mention airing my mother’s dirty laundry.”

Of course not. His pride was as great as hers.

He paused. “This is what I propose: My kinsman, the Duke of Montford is holding a house party at Harcourt. I want you to come. You may bring your little friend if you like. What’s her name?”

“Miss Beauchamp,” Lizzie said. “And I don’t see what you can hope to accomplish by inviting me to a house party.”

“Why, Miss Allbright,” said Lord Steyne with a saturnine curl of his lips. “Only that I mean to seduce you.”

His answer flustered her so much, she could barely find the words to reply. In a stifled tone, she said, “But—but you will introduce me as your marchioness. I’ll have no choice in the matter, anyway.”

“As I said, I am hardly in favor of making a scandal with the story of our marriage.”

He still held her fan. He tapped it on his thigh as he considered. “Only your father and my mother knew that Lady Alexandra Simmons and the Marquis of Steyne were wed that day. Your father is not here to dispute any story we care to tell. My mother was exiled to St. Petersburg a few years ago and need not trouble us. The parson has been eliminated also.”

She froze. “Good gracious, you did not have him killed!”

“Of course not,” said Steyne, visibly annoyed. “My mother paid him off. I believe he was offered a lucrative post in the Americas.”

“Oh.”

She wondered about Lady Steyne, but did not know how to question him. Had he sent his own mother away?

Seeming unaware of the questions he’d raised in her mind, he continued, “Your identity will be revealed at the house party at the appropriate juncture. We will continue the fiction that you lost your memory and we will mention nothing of our prior marriage.”

Steyne narrowed his eyes, as if to bring the prospect he described into focus. “In the meantime, I shall be smitten with your charms. Nothing will do for me but to propose within the week.”

Smitten
. She couldn’t imagine it. “It would almost be worth it to see you act the lovelorn fool.”

He grimaced. “It’s not a role I’ve had cause to play before. No matter. After a week or so, we’ll announce our betrothal. After which, we shall romantically elope and leave immediately for our honeymoon. That should let the rumor mill run out of power by the time we reappear.”

Her tone was dry. “You think I am likely to fall into your arms after one week of courting?” She didn’t see what choice she had in the matter, but he didn’t need to know that.

For an answer, Steyne gave her that direct, piercing look that somehow lit her with cold fire. With a faint curve to his lips, he moved closer. So close that her skin warmed a little from the heat of his body.

That warmth called to her strongly. It was so long, so very long, since anyone had held her.

But she kept her longing in check, clung to her sense of self-preservation like a drowning woman clung to a rope.

His hand came up. She braced for his touch, but didn’t back away. To do so would be to admit how powerfully he affected her.

One gloved finger brushed the pearl that hung from her earlobe. Then it trailed, lightly, ever so lightly, from the sensitive, vulnerable place behind her ear down the curve of her neck until it reached the pearls at her throat.

Tremors shivered within her, tiny fissures snaking through the armor of her defiance.

Galling beyond belief that his slightest caress wreaked such havoc. She’d need to shore up her defenses if she wanted to beat him at his own game.

“Admit it,” he said, fingering the pearls at her throat. “You are more than half in love with me already.”

That broke whatever spell he’d placed her under. How could he taunt her with talk of tender emotions when all of this was so blatantly a lie?

Suppressing her fury, Lizzie stepped back and swept him a curtsy that fairly dripped with dignity. “But my dear Lord Steyne,” she said. “
Love
has nothing to do with it.”

*   *   *

Lizzie turned and blindly hurried up the path, back toward the assembly rooms.

“Lizzie? Is that you?” Mr. Huntley’s deep voice floated down from the terrace above. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere.”

Her head jerked up and she saw him at the top of the stone staircase, silhouetted against the lighted ballroom.

“Oh, plague it!” she muttered. Abruptly, she checked her pace and glided toward the stairs. Her mind worked furiously on an excuse for being there.